


SCARS

by Mikkeneko



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Blood, Catharsis, Gaslighting, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Past Abuse, Self-Harm, Self-Mutilation, Torture Flashbacks, assisted self-harm, unsafe use of painkillers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-29 06:30:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5118635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mikkeneko/pseuds/Mikkeneko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders has got some things in his past that he's trying to repress, and Justice can't leave well enough alone. But when Anders asks him for help of an unorthodox kind, Justice is willing to do anything to help his friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	SCARS

**Author's Note:**

> Justice is sort of borrowing from Cole's gig here; since it's been pretty well established that spirits communicate on a psychic level, I figure that if Cole can read minds, so can Justice. For Cole who is a spirit of Compassion, "it has to be a hurt or a way to help the hurt," so for Justice I posit that he's especially attuned to unaddressed wrongs or unpunished crimes.

Justice often thought - perhaps unkindly - that the mortal world could have been a just one if not for all the  _mortals._

It was not as though he had no experience with mortals - he'd met many dreamers passing in and out of the Fade. But it was different -  _they_  were different - from seeing them in their home world. Dreamers were  _honest,_  direct and open, bleeding their thoughts and feelings and intentions into the misty air of the Fade, clear as a bell for any spirit to hear.

Mortals in their own world did the same, but they also  _said_  and  _did_  things that were at odds with their true thoughts. Justice was familiar with demons, familiar with the concept of deception for trickery and gain, but this - this was something else yet again. Even when there was no malice or intent to deceive, mortals seemed to be incapable of expressing their true thoughts without at least one layer of prevarication. They hid the truth behind layers of politeness, manners, or even humor and jokes.

Especially  _that_  one.

_That_  mortal was most infuriating at all, purely for the contradiction he embodied. Anders was, Justice would not deny, a good man - deeply compassionate and giving, courageous and loyal. Justice did not understand why he insisted on denying it, making announcements about his own laziness and selfishness as though it were a boast. Justice did not understand why Anders kept insisting this was true - even to himself - when it was not.

Justice had always known deceit in the presence of malice. He did not understand deceit in its absence. He did not understand why Anders smiled when he was not happy, why he laughed when he was in pain, why he joked about things that were not funny. What purpose did this serve? It was a complete contradiction in terms to the spirit, and it frustrated and infuriated him.

The first time it happened, Justice had not known what to make of it. It had been a hard mission, a long journey back to the Vigil, and all the mortals had been flagging for fatigue. "This is nothing," Anders had quipped. "I'm a healer, you know; I once stayed awake for seven whole days in a row!"

"That's quite a good trait for a healer to have," Nathaniel had congratulated, and Anders had stretched out a smile and laughed at the compliment, but inside -

_air is stifling, walls crawling, can't breathe, can't think, sluggish like molten lead in his limbs, so tired, so tired, can't think, world goes gray and slides away and then IT hits, world is pain, burning fire in his veins, clawing through every muscle with a screech, heart pounds like it's going to burst, begging for mercy, begging, begging, please let me sleep, just one hour, just one minute, let me sleep_

\- it was not a good thing. It was not a good thing at all. Justice did not understand.

That had been the first time, but not the last.

The second time they were out at the Hafter, a trip to the river for no more than relaxation and fun. The dwarven Wardens splashed and waded in the shallows as the humans ventured out further into the current. Nate played at stalking the others and dragging them under, until Anders called him out with a laughing taunt.

"You think you're hot shit just because you can swim a few feet under water?" he'd jeered, hands on his hips as he stood on a sandbar. "I'll have you know I can hold my breath at least twice that long. I've had practice!"

Oghren responded with a sharp wolf whistle. "Bet the boys all appreciate that skill, Sparkles!" he jeered, and the other Wardens roared with laughter, even Anders laughed at the joke, a beat or two behind, except -

_hand on the back of his head and he goes under again, struggling, pointless, grip like iron, no air, can't breathe, sixty seconds, lungs on fire, eyes are burning, fire under water, hundred seconds, more and more, let me up, let me go, I'll be good, no words no speech no air, chest heaves and lungs suck, can't help but breathe in and he's drowning, drowning, struggle and seize, hands pull him back, cough and spit and vomit, hear the laughter, laughter_

\- except it was not a joke. Why did he treat it like a joke?

Justice sat on the bank for the entirety of the visit, seething at the deception of it and glaring holes in the mortal's back. There was an injustice here, he could see it, he could feel it. Why did Anders persist on pretending there was not?

Tonight was the last straw, at a banquet that Justice did not understand the purpose of at all - things had been going poorly for the arling since the Commander had been called away, and Justice did not see what cause there was to celebrate. Nathaniel had tried to explain it to him - something about raising morale, at lifting the spirits of the Keep's men even in the absence of any decisive victory - but Justice thought the gesture hollow, and unlikely to achieve its purpose.

That didn't stop the mortals from indulging in their favorite revelries, though; the minstrel by the fire plucked out poor imitations of the music of the Fade while the rest of the Keep feasted, and the Wardens (save for Justice) drank. Anders had grown progressively drunker throughout the evening, drawn into a drinking contest with Sigrun, of all people.

"You think you can outdrink me, short stuff?" Anders taunted her, shaking his tankard upside down to show that it was empty before he slammed it back down on the table. There was a small keg set up by the end of the table for refills, and he pointed vaguely in its direction. "I've... I'll have you know I've... I've drunk  _three times_  as much as this before in one go. I've done it!"

"Ha!" Sigrun scoffed, waving down the server for another round. "Skinny little beanpole like you? If you tried to put away half as much as any Legionnaire, you'd pop like a balloon."

"Now that would be something to see!" Velanna said with a giggle, hiding her face in her own mug. They laugh, they smile, they joke, but it's not, it's not, it's not -

_arms restrained, tied at the small of his back, back aching, on fire, head strapped back but he can still see what's happening to his body, can still see it past the dark bulk of the funnel that forces his jaw open, gums bleeding, throat cut and scraped by the edges, liquid pouring and flowing and splashes and he chokes and he must drink, drink or he'll drown, even though it's already too much, his torso is a ball of fire, it's too hard to breathe, too much pressure on his stomach, crushing his lungs, crushing him from the inside, Maker, Maker please make it stop, please, please no more_

\- it's  _not a joke._  How could he hold such memories in his head and cover them with a smile, making atrocities out to be jests? It was wrong and it was unjust and Justice seethed with the need to strike against the source of the wrong, but there was nothing within reach.

Another laugh from Anders - too loud, too forced - grated over his hearing like a scythe, and Justice's limited patience reached its limit. With the scrape of a wooden bunch over rush-covered stone, Justice stood. By now most of the Wardens were too preoccupied to even notice his departure, although Sigrun and Nathaniel looked after him with concern as he stormed out of the hall.

The halls of the Keep were peaceful, at least, when free of the crowding presence of mortal minds. The walls whispered stories of battles past, of shouts and horns and blood spilled, victory and defeat and treachery. Vigil's Keep was an old fortress, which accumulated suffering and deaths as inevitably as dust or cobwebs, but at least the stone was  _honest_  about it.

"Justice!" a familiar voice hailed him, and Justice turned from his preoccupied study of the door lintel to see Anders coming down the corridor towards him, on his way back to the party from the head. His steps were unsteady and he listed to one side until he stopped near Justice to lean against the doorframe and strike an exaggerated pose. "My favorite Fade spirit in this plane of existence! What are you doing out here and not in there? It's a party! And you know, I think I've got Sigrun on the ropes this time."

"False, meaningless revelry holds no pleasure for me," Justice replied stiffly. "I would rather be righting wrongs than ignoring them."

"Oh come on, you said you wanted to learn more about the mortal world," Anders wheedled. "Having fun with your friends is what it's all about. I'm your friend, aren't I? And  _I'm_  having fun - "

The blatant falsehood irritated him, too much to keep his own counsel. "You are not," Justice snapped.

Anders' face fell, and he straightened up from his ridiculous hip-slung posture. "...Wh-what? Of course I..."

Justice stepped forward, his indignation getting the better of him. "Why do you LIE?" he demanded. "I cannot comprehend it! Why do you pretend enjoyment when your mind is full of the memories of horrors? Why do you make jokes out of the atrocities you have endured? Why do you laugh when you are in pain?"

Anders backed away as Justice ranted, and Justice kept pace, following him until the mage's back hit the stone wall and he stopped. The mage had gone pale, sweat starting to stand out on his skin and a familiar glassy sheen in his eyes. "I don't... I'm not lying..." he protested feebly.

"You are! You have!" Justice said passionately. "I hear it again and again. All the times they held you down, you couldn't move, you couldn't breathe, when you thought your lungs would break. You were in pain, great pain. You were frightened, you thought you might die. You felt humiliated, degraded, made less than a person. You were  _wronged_.  _It_ was wrong. It was unjust and it shall not stand!"

"Stop!" Anders cried out, clutching his head. "How are you... Stop looking in my head!"

"I will not! I will not look away!" Justice grabbed Anders' arm, forcing the mage to face him. "I will not pretend that these injustices did not happen! Nor should you."

The moment the cold steel gauntlet closed around the mage's arm, his body went rigid, face and eyes blanking of all expression. He made no sound but Justice still heard it, the overwhelming scream of rejection, remembered fear, pain, and hate.

Justice let go of Anders' arm as though he were the one who had been burned, but the howling cacophony in Anders' mind did not relent. He collapsed against the wall, arms wrapped around himself, hyperventilating and sweating profusely; and Justice knew remorse.

He took a careful step back, then another, checking the angles of the room and the exits so that Anders could see that he was not being trapped, not being blocked in. He sank to a crouch and waited, watching carefully as Anders struggled to master his breathing.

"I am not... one of them," Justice said at last, when the storm of anguish in Anders' mind had abated enough for him to hear. "I am no Templar."

Anders gulped a deep breath, lacing his fingers together and pressing his joined hands against the back of his head. After a minute, he looked up and met Justice's gaze, tears spilling unheeded from his eyes. "I know that," he croaked. His whole body shook. "Just... just give me a minute, okay? I'll be fine." His voice broke on the last word, and he pressed his trembling hand against his mouth, as though to bottle up all the noises that wanted to follow.

"No," Justice frowned. "You won't."

The depth, the sheer raw anguish of Anders' reaction stunned him. He had sought honesty, but not to such an extent. Anders was his friend, not his enemy; a victim of injustices, not a perpetrator of them. He had to redress his carelessness; but how? He was not skilled in the ways mortals used to comfort each other. He tried the only thing he could think of. "I will kill them all," he promised his friend, fiercely and with all the passion of his purpose. "I swear it, Anders. I will find the ones who did this to you and see justice done."

That declaration seemed to bring Anders out of his near-trance, so perhaps it had been the right thing to say. Anders took his hand away from his mouth, hiccuping slightly as he did. "You can't," he said, voice unsteady. "I mean, it's a nice thought, but you can't just... you can't."

"Why not?" Justice wanted to know.

"What do you mean, why not?" Anders waved his hands in an expansive, incredulous gesture. "Because it was years ago! Because there were too many of them, because they're too far away... because I don't even know who all of them were!"

"Do you think that I would be deterred by distance, or by numbers?" Justice was insulted. "I will find every last one of them and ensure that justice is met, even if it would take me a thousand years."

"You would, wouldn't you?" Anders laughed, but it caught on a sob. "That's... that's really sweet of you, in a gruesome sort of way, but... fuck." Anders pressed his palms against his eyes. "I can't... I'm too sober for this conversation."

This did not make much sense to Justice, as Anders was not anything like sober; but then again, very little about the mortal pastime of alcohol made sense. Anders rubbed his eyes again, and straightened up with a new determination. "Let's go somewhere I can get a real drink, and I'll try to explain."

* * *

 

The kitchens of Vigil's Keep were large, and extensively equipped. They also had clear familiarity with Grey Warden appetites; though he did not feel hunger himself, Kristoff's body had a clear memory of the ravenous appetite that would plague him day and night. As a result, all of the Wardens of Vigil's Keep were given free run of the kitchens and stockrooms, any time their hunger drove them; none of the kitchen staff bothered them as they slunk in the kitchen side door and down the stone stairs to the wine cellar.

It was cool and dark down here, the hushed space giving a feeling of privacy and ease. Anders didn't bother with the stacks on stacks of wooden wine racks, instead heading straight for a stray barrel closer to the stairs which had a half-dozen bottles in various states of fullness sitting on its top. He picked up the closest bottle without stopping to read the label, and took a swig straight from the neck.

"That's more like it," Anders said, his voice rasping from the burn of alcohol but steadier now. He frowned at the wine bottles before him, then looked up at Justice with the frown still in place. "Where were we?"

"You were attempting to explain to me why I should not attempt to exact vengeance against the Templars for their crimes," Justice reminded him.

A ghastly laugh escaped Anders' lips. "Because they weren't  _crimes,_  Justice," he said. "Everything they did... it's all standard disciplinary practices at the Tower. I was just the lucky one who happened to get more of it up close and personal than most. Most mages can go years, even their whole lives without undergoing severe discipline even once. Me?" He tapped his chest, a strange mixture of bitterness and pride in the smile hovering on his lips. "I got to see it five times."

"And were your actions truly so infamous as to warrant repeated torture?" Justice said incredulously. He found it hard to believe that any such great outrage could have escaped his sight. "Did you truly commit such heinous crimes?"

"No! No, I didn't!" Anders denied vehemently. The wine sloshed in the bottom of the bottle as he gestured wildly with it. "All I ever did was run. All I ever wanted was to be free! Sure, I could be an obnoxious little shit, but I was never a maleficar. I wasn't, no matter what Rylock said. I never used blood magic, I never called on or bargained with a demon, I never raised a hand against anyone, Templar or civilian. Maker, I don't know why they hated me so much!"

He stopped his wild swinging and took another long drink of the wine. "But no matter how much they tried to discipline me, it never took. I never could toe the line, I could never be the submissive, obedient mage they wanted me to be. I always tried again. No matter what they did to me, I always tried again. I wasn't a maleficar, but I wouldn't submit, either." Anders frowned at the bottle in his hand, as though wisdom could be found at the bottom. "Maybe that was why?"

Anders sighed, putting the empty bottle aside and picking up another, staring at it with hollow eyes. "But the point is that there was no crime, Justice. This isn't just a case of a rogue Templar or two - this is what the system is. What happened to me, what they did... it was  _allowed."_

"Their punishments were far disproportionate to the offenses that they were supposedly for," Justice argued. "Even if it was against no law, it is still a violation of justice. Not only they, but the ones who ordered them to it - the ones wrote the code itself are complicit in this crime."

"You think so?" Anders snorted. "How far back do you intend for that go? Not just the templars who held me down but the Knight-Commander, who commanded them? What about the First Enchanter, who allowed it? What about the healer they called in when my breathing stopped, who looked me over and declared me fit to continue? The Grand Cleric who appointed Gregoir, the Divine who commissioned the tower in the first place? The whole Chant that sings of the sin a mage commits just by existing, or the faithful masses who empower them? How do you plan to subpeona an entire religion to appear in court?"

Justice stayed silent, not letting any of the angry denials that seethed behind his lips slip free. He was not a child, and despite what the others thought of him, he was not a fool. The Fade had been simple, but the mortal world was not; Justice understood that, as much as it frustrated him. Evil in the mortal world, he was quickly coming to learn, could not always be defeated with a sword.

But that did not mean that he intended to do  _nothing_.

Anders sighed, correctly interpreting his mutinous silence as neither agreement nor acquiescence. "I know you want the world to be honest, Justice," he said sadly. "I know you want things to be black and white, right and wrong. But sometimes that just can't be."

"There must be something we can do," Justice muttered, shifting uneasily. "There must be some way. Can we not ask others for help? The Commander, your friends?"

"Maker, no!" Anders' reaction was immediate and horrified; he backed away, shaking his head. "The last thing I want is for  _them_ to know!"

"Why not?" Justice pinned Anders with a glare. "You seem fine with them knowing in jest, but not in truth."

"You want to know why I laugh?" Anders demanded, gesturing towards himself. "I laugh because  _they_ laugh. I laugh because it's easier to make the joke than to be the joke. I make it light so that it doesn't crush me. I joke and I laugh and I tease because I don't want to be alone, and nobody wants to be around a... a whiner, a bellyacher."

Justice shook his head. "I do not understand how anyone could deny it," he said. The scars on your soul are very clear."

"Yes, well." Anders' shoulders sagged with defeat. "Not everyone has your eyes, Justice."

The bottle of wine he'd been drinking from drained empty; Anders set it aside, and picked up another one. The potent liquor seemed to be having its usual effect on him, loosening his muscles and unlocking his tongue. "Most people, the people who live normal lives, they have no idea," he said. No idea at all. Just a vague set of ideas that they get from stories and if you don't fit neatly into the boxes, you're discounted.

"They think if it's done in a clinical office with a priest looking on, it can't be blood magic. That if there's no whips and manacles, it can't be slavery. That if there's no bruises, it can't be abuse. That if there's no floggers and red-hot irons, it can't be torture." He gave a bitter laugh, hands rubbing at his wrists, at the ghost of leather cuffs whose outlines Justice could clearly see.

"Then you must tell them otherwise," Justice prodded him. "They must learn. Nothing will change until they understand."

"Don't you think I've tried?" Anders whirled on him. At Justice's meaningful look, he scowled and made a throw-away motion towards the rest of the Keep above them. "I mean... not now, not with them! I used to try. They just laughed. People don't want to listen, don't want to hear. And what proof did I have? Nothing! Not a thing. Not a mark, not a scar. They were so very careful about that."

Anders began pacing, short quick steps that rapidly crossed and recrossed the narrow stone room. "That's why they do it the way that they do, you know," he continued. That's why all their 'disciplinary measures' don't leave marks, don't break skin. On paper, the reason is so that the mage being disciplined doesn't resort to blood magic. Wouldn't want that, would they? They don't want to give us anything that we could use to fight back, not even ourselves. But it also means there's no proof. There's never any proof. Not for the First Enchanter, not for the Seekers, and not for anyone else!

"It's just our word against the Templars, and who would ever believe a mage's word? All they have to do is deny it, and they can get a dozen of their fellows to repeat their story. To repeat over and over that it isn't serious, it isn't a big deal, that you're overreacting... that you're just weak. Just pitiful, to feel so much pain from such a minor little thing. That you're whining, seeking attention, making things up to make them look bad. That's what everybody else sees, that's what they think. That I was just whining. Whining about  _nothing_ because I don't know what  _real suffering is!"_

At the peak of his tirade, Anders turned and threw the mostly-empty bottle against the nearest wall. It hit the stone and smashed into glittering pieces, glass shards pattering against the floor while the liquid dripped down the wall. In a fury Anders seized the other empty bottle and swung it like a club; the glass shattered and splintered from the body all the way up into the neck, cracking apart into razor-sharp shards in his grip and slicing his palm to ribbons.

Justice startled, shaken out of the near-trance he'd fallen into, watching Anders pace and rant and feeling the righteous anger surging under his skin. For a moment, Anders had been glorious, full of passion and conviction and fury against the wrongs of the world. Now he stood stock-still in the stone cellar, fury turning cold and running down out of him like the blood ran down his arm.

"Well, that was dumb of me," Anders said shakily. He lifted his other hand to grip his wrist, and the Fade sang in him as white fire gathered in his palm and poured over the wounds. The flow of blood slowed, then stopped; the last few drops ran sluggishly down his elbow as the cuts went pink, then white, then vanished.

For a long time Anders stood there, staring at the unmarked skin of his hand. When he looked up to meet Justice's gaze, his expression was desolate. "Look at me," he said, his voice catching. "No scars. You wouldn't even know anything was wrong, just to look at me. Even my body cannot speak for me. Even my skin has been silenced."

"Then you should leave the scar," Justice said.

Anders let out a shaky laugh. "Wouldn't that be a kind of deception? If I could have healed it, but didn't? I thought you hated that."

"It seems more deception to heal it," Justice said. "If you are in pain, your body should show that pain. Others should know of it."

"Maybe I should have," Anders said softly, staring down at the unmarked skin. Slowly he closed his hand, tightening it into a fist. "Maybe I should..."

For a long time he was lost in his own thoughts, shadowed beyond Justice's understandings; if it was not about a crime, or a wrong unanswered, it slipped past him unheard. He stayed, all the same - because his friend seemed to need someone, and because there was nowhere else he would rather be.

"Justice." Anders looked up at him, and his face was set with a new conviction - something cold, and dark, and so determined that it sent a thrill throughout Justice's being. "Justice, can I... ask you to help me with something?"

"Anything," Justice answered without hesitation.

* * *

 

Justice approached the infirmary as the midnight bell finished tolling, just as Anders had asked. The corridors were dark and quiet except for the passing lights and footsteps of the sentries on the wall; the interior hallways were deserted.

He'd been to the infirmary before - not to seek aid for himself, who did not need it and could not use it, but to spend time in the company of Anders. He raised one gauntleted hand to the wooden portal and knocked twice, deep booming impacts that echoed down the quiet corridor.

The door opened to reveal Anders, the room behind him lit by only a few low-burning lamps. His golden eyes were wide, pupils huge and dark, and he was dressed in a loose shabby linen robe that he held closed with one hand. He blinked slowly at Justice, then looked over his shoulder at the empty corridor beyond before ushering Justice inside.

"Thank you for coming," Anders said as he closed the door behind Justice. "I wasn't sure you would. I know this isn't... well. It's asking a lot of you."

"I cannot pretend that I am comfortable with it," Justice admitted.

"Are you sure you can do this?" Anders fidgeted, picking at the hem of his loose robe. "I mean, I know you don't approve of... deceptions. Lies, basically. And that's basically what this is. Not... I mean, I won't outright lie to people... but I mean to let them draw their own conclusions. Are you really okay with that? I feel kind of bad, asking you to do something that goes against your nature."

Justice looked away, searching through himself for the truth to answer Anders' worry. "You are not wrong," he said. "I disapprove of deceptions, and I do not... like... this. I would not do it under other circumstances. But it is more unjust for a wrong to go ignored, to be covered up and silenced. It must be known, and if the only way to address a great wrong is with a smaller one... then I accept that is what must be done. And you are my friend. I will help you in any way that I can."

"Well, I... Thanks." Anders smiled tremulously at him, wringing one hand in the other. "Thanks, Justice. That means a lot to me. I trust you."

And that meant a lot to Justice. He nodded once, not daring to speak.

Anders took a deep breath, and was off in a flurry of motion, barring the door behind Justice, setting protective covers over the lamps, clearing a few stray objects off the desk and shelves. "The infirmary will be closed tomorrow and the next day, barring a serious emergency," he told Justice over his shoulder. "I've told everybody I'm cleaning up after a virulently infectious patient. Nobody will disturb us. By the time anyone seriously comes looking, it will all be over with."

"And you will heal yourself, after?" Justice wanted to know. He had powers that mortals did not, but he had no command over mortal flesh.

"Yes. Well. Somewhat, not completely. That's the whole point, after all. I should have plenty of time to get back on my feet before we have to go anywhere, don't you worry." Anders opened a drawer and pulled out something dark and looped and coiled. He turned and took a few steps to Justice, holding it out in both hands. "I was able to find this in the storerooms. Best not to ask what it was doing there."

Justice didn't have to ask; he knew, as soon as he took the whip in his hands, all the screaming and bleeding history that had gone into it. With his hand on the handle, the length of braided leather fell to the floor, a soft pattering that whispered of the flesh and blood of criminals, traitors, deserters, poor unlucky fools. Blood, pain, fear... "Are you determined to go through with this?" he asked. "I do not wish for you to be hurt."

Anders smiled. "Oh don't worry about that," he said. "Before you got here I dosed myself with so much poppy juice and embrium that I wouldn't notice if a templar stuck his sword through my chest right now. I won't feel any pain. Promise."

Justice nodded wordlessly, accepting Anders' assurances. He shook the long whip out on the floor, momentarily mesmerized by the patterns it made in the air, slithering over the floor like a living thing. Anders followed it with his huge, dark eyes, swallowed, and took a deep breath.

His hands went to the hem of his linen robe and he tugged it off, hanging it carefully on a hook on the wall. Underneath he wore nothing but a pair of stained and tattered trousers, sock feet against the hard stone floor.

In the middle of the infirmary, a large space of floor had been cleared, cots and benches and desks pushed back against the walls; only one padded chair remained, pushed up against a support beam. Anders went over to the chair and sat astride it backwards, his chest against the back and his back open to the room. He shook out a length of cord and, as Justice watched, tied one end around his left wrist. He looped the cord up over the rafter of the support beam, then looked over to Justice. "I'll need you to tie my other hand," he explained. "Take up the slack, so that it supports me and keeps me in place."

Justice frowned. "Why is this necessary?" he demanded. "I thought you said you would feel nothing."

"I won't. Well, not consciously. But my body will still know that it's being damaged," Anders admitted. "I might not have the strength to keep myself up for all of it. This is just... just a precaution."

Justice scowled, but he'd agreed to trust Anders' word in this. He went over and fixed the ropes, as Anders directed; binding his right wrist the same way as the left one, winding the rope until his arms were pulled up above his head, his back stretched and taut beneath them. "Good," Anders said, testing the strength of the ropes and then relaxing into them. "Perfect."

He glanced over his shoulder at Justice, his eyes still huge and dark from the drug. He wet his lips slightly before he spoke. "Start low and move higher," he instructed. "Otherwise the blood will run down and you won't be able to see what you're doing. It might take you a few strokes to really get the feel of it, but don't... don't hold back, and don't stop once you get started. If... if you stop in the middle, we'll probably have to do it all again later, and that won't be fun for either of us."

Justice nodded, accepting Anders' direction, and Anders turned his face back towards the post, resting his forehead against the wood. Justice swung the whip experimentally, feeling how the length of it cut through the air, and saw the skin of Anders' back shiver.

Wordlessly, Justice put a gauntleted hand on Anders' shoulder. Anders gasped softly, tensing up, but then after a long moment his head dropped forward. "Let's do it," he whispered.

It began.

Justice swung the whip in careful, measured strokes; despite Andes' warning not to hold back, it was better to start too soft and increase the force, than to overestimate and rip Anders's flesh to the bone. In order to properly scar, the leather edge of the whip had to cut through skin, maybe even into the muscle beneath; but they had a long way to go, and Anders needed to still have strength at the end to stop the bleeding.

The handle felt surprisingly natural in his hand, the arc of the whip familiar and controlled. At first Justice thought it was because it was not dissimilar to the strokes of a sword, but as he watched rent after rent appear on the smooth skin of Anders' back, he realized it was more than that. He was drawing from his own nature, from the essence of the Fade, from the memories of mortals who had performed this act countless times before him. This was, after all, a common punishment for many crimes in the mortal world; this, too, was a part of justice. A darker part, a crueler part, but still well within his demesne.

He did not enjoy this, but he did understand it. Understood the cruelty of it and understood, too, the necessity.

Fifty strokes, Anders had said. Justice measured them carefully, painted them over Anders' skin - starting from the bottom, as he suggested, and working his way up, lash after lash laying themselves across Anders' spine, cutting across the muscles of his back. There wouldn't be room for them all, he realized; some of them would have to overlap, overlay the others.

At first, Anders' body flinched as the whip drew near it, but he never made a sound. Gradually, though, his body relaxed, leaning more of his weight against the post and sagging into the embrace of the ropes. About halfway through, he began giggling softly, continuously. More than any other part of this, that soft sound unnerved Justice, nearly made his hand falter.

As much as he wanted to demand why Anders was behaving in such away - how he could possibly, even now, make this something to laugh at - he took Anders' warnings to heart, and did not stop. Anders' back was a mass of welts, by now, the skin painted with bright gore, trickling in rivulets and slow waves down his back to pool in the waistband of his pants. Blood flew with every lash of leather, painting the floor, spattering the walls, and Anders' lie about needing to thoroughly clean the clinic was turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When at last the count reached fifty, Justice took a step back, letting the leather thong fall to the floor. The floor squelched slightly under his step, blood sticking to the soles of his boots, but Justice ignored it. He set the whip aside, careless of it now that its function was done, and moved forward to his friend's side.

Anders was no longer giggling, although long tremors ran through his body, starting at his bound wrists and running down his arms, through his chest and to his hips. His head hung low between his arms, wisps of blond hair coming out of the tight knot he'd pulled it into and sticking to his sweat- and blood-drenched skin. Justice reached up to undo the knots - they had not been very complex to begin with, little more than slipknots to bear the weight. "Anders," Justice said, trying to bring his friend back from wherever he had gone. "It is done."

The mess that was his back kept on oozing - not the forceful spurt of arterial blood nor the steady draining stream of a pieced vein, but bleeding nonetheless, a continuous loss every second. "Anders," Justice called his name again, placing a gloved hand on his shoulder above the cuts. "You must heal. The bleeding must stop, Anders."

At that the healer roused himself, picking up his head and looking around him in surprise. "Oh... bleeding?" he murmured. " 'S right... that's what tickles." Another giggle escaped him, but then he took a deep breath and gathered focus with a palpable effort. Pale white fire lit his palms and crawled down his arms, diffusing across his skin as he focused in on himself, seeking damage to heal.

Justice felt it, the sparking vivacity of the magic as it burrowed into every cell, urging torn flesh to grow, to mend, to heal. Under his watchful eyes, the skin of Anders' back shivered and rippled, the edges of the bloody rents drawing closed, new raw pink appearing to suture shut the wounds. The steady tide of blood slowed to a trickle, and the magic cut off a moment later, leaving the vicious wounds half-healed. "There," Anders mumbled. "That should scar up real nice, without me exsanguinating in my sleep."

"Sleep is what you now require," Justice told him. Anders slumped in the chair, the combination of injury and healing having exhausted him. With care and effort Justice got him to his feet, and guided him like a sleepwalker over to an empty nearby cot, helping him lay down on his front.

Without a word Justice stood up, walked over to Anders' cabinets of healing supplies, and came back a few minutes later with all that he needed. Healing was not part of Justice's identity; he had neither healing magic nor mortal healing knowledge. But Kristoff had, and the dead man's memories told Justice what to do; wet washcloths to clean the blood off Anders' skin, a basin of water turning a deep pink where the cloths were rinsed out. Wide cotton pads were unrolled and laid out across the unhealed wounds, and bandages wrapped around Anders' torso to keep them in place. Anders let him work, moving where Justice moved him without argument or resistance, although every now and then another little snicker escaped him.

"Why do you laugh?" Justice asked him, although his hands did not cease at winding the bandages. He tied off the end in a bow, made clumsy by his numb fingers, but it would suffice until Anders was well enough to care for himself.

"Because I'm high as a kite right now, Justice," Anders said with a groan, rolling up on his side and flinging his arm over his face. Into his elbow, muffled, he said, "But it's at least a little funny... don't you think? That now my outsides will match my insides."

Justice looked over Anders, the wrung-out exhaustion, the raw half-healed wounds, the sickly unnatural smile, and he thought that was probably true.

Anders lowered his arm and stared out over the infirmary, newly painted with blood. "What a mess," he mumbled. "Guess I'm going to have to clean this all up. In the morning..."

"I will assist you," Justice told him. "I am partly responsible too, after all."

A shaking hand reached for his gauntlet, squeezing gently before falling back to the bed. "Thanks," Anders breathed. "Thanks for all of this. It means so much - I can't tell you how much it means, to have someone I could trust with this."

Justice stared at the point of contact. It was, as far as he could remember, the first time that Anders had ever touched him willingly. The first time, and it came after Justice had used that hand to spill his blood, to tear open his flesh, to wash him clean. "...it was my honor," he said at last.

Anders eased back, his breathing slowing and deepening until he almost seemed like a corpse himself. Justice began to stand, with an eye towards the mop and bucket over in the corner; as the armor creaked and clattered, Anders' eyes slitted open again. "Where are you going?" Anders murmured.

"I thought I would begin now," Justice said, gesturing towards the blood painted everywhere. "It will be more difficult to remove once it's entrenched."

"Too late for that now," Anders muttered. "But I think... I'd really rather if you stayed. While I slept."

Justice waited for more - more explanation, more instruction - but none came. Anders was lost to sleep (or unconsciousness) once more. Slowly, he sat back down on the stool, and picked up Anders' hand again. Kindness was not a part of Justice's nature, but for this mortal's sake, he would try.

Justice did not think that what they had done here tonight had made this world a kinder place. But it was, perhaps, the first step towards making it a more just one.

* * *

~end.

**Author's Note:**

> So I may have read one too many fic scenes where Hawke/Fenris/whoever gets a look at Anders' scarred-up back and suddenly has an epiphany about the shitty treatment of mages in Thedas and feels bad for not having taken Anders seriously before. 
> 
> This is not to say that I object to such fics, it's just that I object to the fact that this is apparently the only kind of abuse characters seem capable of recognizing -- and the fact that it's _instantly recognizable as abuse_ is why I think the Templars would usually avoid it. Plausible deniability and all that. But then you get to DA2 and apparently the Gallows templars [just up and whip the shit out of their mages for minor offenses](http://bubonickitten.tumblr.com/post/107877798753/da2-mage-rights-reference-post) so that headcanon went out the window. 
> 
> Still, it may be different from Circle to Circle; Meredith's Templars were exceptionally brutal and lacking in oversight, so maybe they just didn't care. Either way even Kinloch Hold, one of the "good" Circles, [still has an entire basement](http://mikkeneko.tumblr.com/post/132299537909/looking-for-a-vacation-destination-in-sunny) [full of torture equipment.](http://bubonickitten.tumblr.com/post/126865146088/daoawakening-mage-reference-post)


End file.
